Dylan Madeley's Blog, page 9
August 20, 2016
August 18, 2016
August 17, 2016
August 16, 2016
August 15, 2016
August 14, 2016
August 8, 2016
Sequel free to read until September 14; daily fiction to commence
Want to know what happens to Derek, Chandra, Lucen, Jan? Want to know what Alathea’s next move is, but can’t wait for that final formal polished published version? Okay. All 32 chapters and the epilogue are up on Wattpad. You can get the Wattpad app free on your mobile device, and also read the whole thing in its present condition free, and all I really hope for is a bump in my stats.
This comes to an end on September 14, my birthday.
Fresh Fiction Daily
From August 14 to September 14, I will be putting up hastily slapped together fiction on various platforms.
It seems to me that I typically spend half a November project warming up, then hit my stride. For TCPV, it’s not that the whole thing didn’t need editing, but the first eight chapters specifically needed (and got) a rewrite. I like to think that over more diligent editing cycles, the reader might not know anymore where my first draft hit its stride because the quality will be more even.
This November’s project is so important that I feel the need to warm up sooner.
Doubt is also a thing. For my personal writing process, I need to approach things casually and positively at the start, and some part of me resents attempted use of negative reinforcement as a motivator; I know how easily discouraged I can be, and also how easily negative I can be all the time, and that feeds doubt which can distract me from what I actually want to accomplish. More specifically, it’s fuel for the types of intrusive thoughts that aren’t helpful to the project at hand. I need to feel at least okay, and I need to focus.
My goal is to come up with no quality expectations, minimal possible editing (I’d say no editing, but look who’s writing this blog, good luck with that–but restraining it to a personal minimum is something different), no minimum or maximum word count, no real pressure but to make sure I wring out Fresh Flash Fiction Daily, and then inflict it on the world for better or worse.
I will place it on Wattpad, I will place it here, I will share links on the FB page (which, if possible, will soon be rebranded “Dylan Madeley, Writer”, since it’s going to have to serve multiple titles soon).
July 30, 2016
Reading post-mortem: introducing the antagonist
In this particular trilogy, antagonists are people who are good at having very lofty visions, but not at questioning the need for their methods. Not once they get started. They are powered by absolute belief in the necessity of what they do. Whatever needs to be destroyed along the way, whoever needs to die, all justified by the ends pursued. If they stopped to question whether what they’re doing is actually a valid means to the end, that hesitation might ruin everything. That lapse in faith might curse them.
Protagonists have an uphill battle, to put it one way. They arrive super aware of the problematic aspects of their privilege, but they see that they could potentially wield this privilege to change things for the better. Everything that an antagonist might dismiss as a “bump in the road” is a big deal and deserves scrutiny and thought. Protagonists must have the courage to doubt, think twice, reconsider, but ultimately act in the best way they can given the limitations of their resources and knowledge at that instant. They have that valiant struggle against people of absolute faith, who don’t face the same intellectual/moral hindrance to their actions and are therefore unpredictably dangerous. But there are negative consequences to never questioning, and it can also be bad practice for those inconvenient times where physical reality/actual happenings don’t unfold the way you had absolute faith they would, and where thinking on the fly can mean everything.
That creates a three-book plot arc where the primary antagonist starts off with the largest armies, the newest invented weapons and the expertise to use them, and absolute faith that she represents both the demolition of the old world and the construction of a better one; she is so sure that her actions are going to save the world from conditions of injustice, by any means necessary, that she doesn’t do a lot to question the means, and dismisses the advice of her closest associate because it represents doubt and faithlessness to her. And the protagonists still have hope in the face of that, because they second guess, make contingency plans, understand at all times and with deep gravity the human cost of whatever they intend to do versus the human cost of not acting; they have the courage to doubt, and at the best of times, the strength to make sure doubting doesn’t stop them but forces them to behave considerately/thoughtfully.
The reading I did at Albert Campbell Library was an illustration of this. Alathea is going to take full credit for something it took an expert captain, crew, navigator, and thundery contingent to accomplish, and utterly no practical skill from Alathea, but does she speak or behave as if she values their lives particularly much? I feel in the end it’s a bit heavy (and also gory) for a public reading, where given the type of audience, levity is key. I feel a bit like the audience needed the balance of levity and seriousness you get from the better Marvel movies, while I gave them a super serious super grim Batman vs Superman type experience.
The full text of the reading is behind the cut. It is from Chapter Two of The Crown Princess’ Voyage, which is available for preview on Wattpad.
Alathea was already half-way up the stairs when the bells sounded. The commotion audible from the deck would have warned her just as quickly. She hurried to the deck.
“Goddess!” The captain called. “It found us before we saw any sign of it. We avoided it by a wave and a gust of wind, nothing more. It could have capsized us. If we keep circling it’s sure to take us head-on.”
“Then turn sharper!” she snarled back, “Get us sidelong to it by the time it returns. Command the thundery, get them ready.”
She would have insisted he notify the fishing crew, but they were quite aware of what was happening and what their role would be. The only people not scrambling about the deck in a near-panic were toiling in the thundery below, and Rheb was cowering in the cabin.
The captain hurried over to the helmsman, shaking his head. When his orders were questioned, the captain shoved the helmsman off the wheel and prepared to make the dangerous manoeuvre; the helmsman could steer well enough to get them through the Fringe, but the captain had made that same run in his youth, and he was familiar with the nuances of the wheel.
By this time, the Longneck had ducked below water and begun racing after its large wooden quarry. The monster’s second approach was nigh.
Alathea thought of something as this started. “Someone go down there and make sure no hatch is opened before the ship straightens out! Once it does, they can immediately open up and take aim.”
Asking the crew to have common sense was sometimes a tall order.
A guard raced to the thundery-hatch to deliver her message. Shortly afterward, the captain’s manoeuvre commenced; the guard was lucky to be climbing the secured ladder by then, for the ship nearly capsized from the sharp turn, and a couple of men dropped overboard from the rigging.
She stood in a wide stance, clutching the railing almost tight enough to leave fingernail marks in the wood; she saw a shadow approach underwater before the beast reared its neck out of the ocean. It barely missed striking the mast with its head and sent some weak waves over the deck.
Her heart nearly stopped at the sight; this was what lived in the unfathomable depths, below the same kind of constant beautiful waves that lulled her to sleep each night. She briefly forgot all about the weapons of the ship, feeling a fear that she just barely suppressed, and watched the creature pluck a figure from up the rigging as if the crewman were fruit on a high branch.
Barely any of him must have been sliced by its enormous teeth before it faced its jaw toward the sky and appeared to swallow him whole.
Loud blasts startled her further, but these she had no reason to fear. These were the thunders blasting metal spheres through the open hatches in the side of the ship. The weapons were too new for her to have become used to their roar.
One shot missed altogether. The other three converged on the creature’s neck, not blowing through-and-through but tearing its spine such that a long neck with a monstrous head broke from the rest of the body and fell to the deck.
She stood there for a moment as the snake-like column of scales flopped and thrashed for a moment. She saw the look in its eyes as it surrendered to death. Its blood drenched her furs and much of the deck; some blood ran into the eye-holes of her mask, down the mask, to her lips, presenting her with the taste for which she once wished.
There was a moment of respite. Some of the crew were knocked over or dove out of the way of the severed neck and head, the open and bloody side of which stuck out over the right side of the ship. The head was partly over the left side, threatening to drag the rest of the neck down that way with its weight. The sails and mast had been facing at just the right angle to avoid being struck by the falling column of flesh, and it was a small miracle none of the rigging had tangled.
Alathea blinked and regained her senses. “I demand the fishing crew tie that head down before it slips away! And I want to know the status of the thundery. Captain?”
His head peeked over the bulk of the neck. “Safely intact.”
“Turn us back home. I care not for the rest of the monster’s body.” She swaggered back toward the cabin.
She was alive with the charge of blood and struggle and death, and most importantly of nature’s most terrifying foe having been slain at her command.
“My Goddess, what of the men overboard?” The captain asked hurriedly.
She turned and glared back at him through her bloody mask.
“Don’t let them delay us. If we’re not on course for home when I once more set foot on this deck, you can join them.”
July 14, 2016
Previous and Future Readings
At the end of this post I’m going to enclose the previous reading I did, exactly as it appeared in the printed document.
So, as per my previous post, I’m going to be reading at another local authors night (link goes to Facebook event).
You can actually read any excerpt I could pull out, because my focus these days is on my next book, The Crown Princess’ Voyage (Book 2, The Gift-Knight Trilogy). Provided you can navigate Wattpad’s interface and/or tablet app, and don’t mind reading from a screen (I say that because some people really prefer paper), both The Gift-Knight’s Quest and The Crown Princess’ Voyage are available online and free to read. There are some other drafts up there which have not yet had a single editing pass, so… reader beware. With the two full novels, even though they’ve had numerous editing passes, that’s exactly why you now get further license to complain when I missed the obvious typo.
I don’t know how long they’ll both be up there. I was hoping to get a few interested readers who wouldn’t have otherwise risked buying the book before they tried it. I’m also a small-time author and in order for someone to want to “steal” a book that’s not meant to be read free, I would have to be popular enough for that to be a concern. If J.M. Frey can put books on Wattpad for trial without being too worried about it, and this is kinda something I felt encouraged by her to do, I have nothing to worry about.
And now, the previously read excerpt (which is not what I’ll be reading next Wednesday). Jan is a supporting character from Book 1 who starts to develop his own plot arc where he’s in charge. When it starts, he’s still under Chandra’s orders and waiting for her to be done whatever diplomatic visit she’s committed to, but he has to take immediate action. Then her decision making basically drives them apart. It was always easy when being loyal to the Kenderley family necessarily meant protecting their kingdom of Kensrik and its people, but what happens when these two things are forcibly separated? Chandra has a very difficult choice to make and I think she made the practical one, but Jan doesn’t agree.
Context summary: After the events of The Gift-Knight’s Quest, violent unrest forces Chandra to sail away from home—with her private fleet, her Army, guard captain, and knight. They quickly learn that nowhere in the known world is safe, whether on land or sea, thanks to a strange enemy who has basically invented the cannon. This scene occurs after Chandra made a difficult decision. Either her army could enter Derek’s homeland and try to defend it against a large army that has already toppled the world’s most massive fortifications; or try to sail back home to defend Kensrik, and most likely be sunk by the enemy along the way. She chooses to help Derek’s homeland because she’s certain they would never get back to Kensrik in time. Her guard captain Jan, unquestioningly loyal for a book and a half, refuses to order any of his men to abandon their homeland. Derek suggests a compromise: let Jan take the sailors, since the forces on land have no need for them, and let Jan state his case before the soldiers so each person can decide for themselves. Both sides accept this idea, leading to this scene.
“Thank all of you for coming by to listen. I’ll get to it quick, your country needs you. And your Crown Princess needs you, too. For the first time, you don’t get to help both at once. It’s the choice of your life, and neither one’s got safety assured. You sailors, I have something for you to do. I can’t force you to get on those ships, but they need to be sailed, and that’s the one way you can continue being of service. Where the Crown Princess Chandra goes, now, they only have a need for soldiers. And while it might seem tempting to take off, somehow finding some use for yourself in the middle of nowhere, your country needs what you can do, so you’d better think deeply about that. And for the rest of you, I need men willing to learn how to work these weapons. You have to do exactly as I’ve told you to use them safely, and the rest is the limited time you’ll have to learn aiming. Don’t feel like I don’t need you if I get just enough men for each weapon, because this is war, and you may find yourself having to replace a wounded or a dead man. But like I said, I can’t force you; we’re not the Kenderley Navy, the last Kenderley has chosen to fight this next part of the war entirely on land, with her knight in command. Honestly, she wouldn’t be any safer with us. We’re up against ships as deadly as the one we’ve captured, and faster than anything else you’ve ever sailed on, like the one Sir Derek stole for us. They’re up against an army that knocked down the frontier wall. If you’re with me, then you’ve decided that Kensrikans may as well face long odds for their homeland, and let the Plainsmen face long odds for theirs. Don’t think that makes us the Kensrikan Navy, either, even if everything we do now is to save ungrateful people who kicked us out in the first place. If we live through this, if we win, I can’t guarantee a parade, but I can guarantee we’ll have done what’s right. That’s all I’ve got to say now, so make your choice. And try to make it fast, because Bayrock can’t wait for so long; weapons like what we’ve now seen, lots of them could be pointed at the old Palace all too soon.”
Jan stepped back and turned a bit. He wasn’t going to give anyone a guilt stare, because all he believed he had done was offer them a choice of which death seemed most noble.
Did the Plains want Chandra any more than Kensrik? What was fighting for one ungrateful land versus fighting for another? It mattered to Jan if one of those ungrateful lands was home.
“You’ve got us, Captain Jan,” said one sailor who spoke for all others, and broke Jan out of his brooding with a hearty slap on the back.
Jan smiled and nodded, still refusing to look straight at the whole group. He next looked up at a man whose broken nose had never quite healed straight.
“I can’t go with you,” said Lucas.
Jan laughed bitterly. “And it was worth your time walking up to me to say no?”
“Yessir, it was. You have to say no to a great man, at least say it to his good ear. What’d you expect me to do, just walk away, not a word? After what we’ve been through?”
“Oh, Lucas, you glorious idiot.” Jan grabbed the man in a tight hug which deprived the smaller man of breath for its duration, but Jan made sure it wasn’t too long.
Jan kept his hands on the man’s shoulders and they smiled at each other, at arms’ length.
“Goodbye, Captain. Watch out for flying jugs.” Lucas said.
“Goodbye, Lucas. Don’t let Sir Derek off easy; talk back to him for me, but not in battle. Great Sky, keep your mouth shut in battle.” Jan said.
The next joiners were all the soldiers who had sailed with Jan on the Red Sky, minus Lucas who already bade farewell. They were all happily walking to their probable doom, and if by chance they survived this, he would tell them their official name, inspired by his exchange with Lucas: Jan’s Glorious Idiots. He wouldn’t admit it a moment sooner, in case they took it personally. The less familiar soldiers who decided to join them were no better.
As a handful of others, mostly strangers, walked away to join Sir Derek’s camp, Jan sat on a beach boulder and stared at the sand. He knew that his name fit perfectly into the official title of this group. What better leader for Glorious Idiots than Jan Donde, the biggest one of all?
And there came Chandra, walking toward him, head covered but for her face in a thin dark shawl to protect from the sun. The same woman who would freely roam the halls of the Kenderley Palace when Jan wanted her to be watched carefully at all times was on the beach unattended; why would she change now?
“Good evening, Jan. Have you got all you need? All the men and supplies?” She asked.
Jan nodded slowly, but said nothing.
“I suppose I should call you Admiral, now. But then, I’m not calling Derek a General.”
“You can call me what you like,” Jan replied, “I’m Captain Jan. I guess we’re pirates, more or less. It’s not like Lucen’s hired or sanctioned us for what we’re going to do.”
Chandra closed her eyes guiltily for a brief moment.
“Yes. This act is yours, this choice. I don’t get to give you a title, or to own what you’ll achieve without me. I’m sorry, Jan. I wish you all the best. Please make it through this alive.”
“As far as I get to choose that, I will. I’ll send word when there’s something to say,” Jan replied.
She looked at him and she doubted he would invite any embrace. This big man, almost fatherly in his protectiveness when she needed to be escorted safely away from Queen Alisand’s funeral, from King Jonnecht’s demise; she used to wonder if there was anywhere in the world she could go that he wouldn’t follow if she might be in peril. Now she knew where, but there were compelling reasons why.
Chandra shed a tear and turned and walked away. Jan just watched, quietly making sure nothing happened to her while she remained within view, and accepting once she was out of sight that he had chosen different responsibilities. No one said a proper goodbye.
July 4, 2016
Next Appearance Will Be At Albert Campbell Library
A friend recently asked me how I get into so many local author/library events. There’s not really a genius plan to it or any secret, it’s a “daisy chain” of networking, luck, interest and availability. Between my one day at Ad Astra and the Vaughan Public Libraries local author book fair, I met the same contact who kept inviting me to The Bookshelf in Newmarket, so that brought me there. A Toronto group I’m in, and the VPL local author book fair, both have another friend who just invited me to the next appearance I will make. It will probably come full circle when I make sure I vend at Ad Astra next time.
On July 20 at Albert Campbell Library, there will be a Toronto Public Libraries local author fair from 6:15PM until 8PM. I will have a vending table set up with a monitor to screen a select book trailer, and copies of The Gift-Knight’s Quest for sale with autographs. I will also read a selection of the sequel, The Crown Princess’ Voyage, and aim to stay within the five minute mark–time limits get tricky with my stutter, but I tend to aim for less than five minutes’ worth of material under “alone” conditions so there’s a time buffer to work with. I’m long winded and wordy and that poses a selection challenge, but I’ll find something that works. Then there will be a question period. I won’t be the only presenter, of course, but I’ll post more information as I get it (if necessary).
Back to the point of live events, it’s also a matter of where you are, and where you’re willing to go. Years of trekking into Toronto on public transit for social events has somehow grown on me, which is good because I don’t know how many events happen close to where I live; the VPL event happened within my city, but my city’s also like a bunch of towns and villages that were redrawn into one map boundary some time 25+ years ago to make a municipality. No place I’ve lived is 100% close to everything I want to do, and the closer places are also more expensive to live in. If you don’t live close to anything and commutes don’t work for you, there’s lots you can accomplish on the internet instead.
Here are also a few facts that I’m repeatedly told. If you have one book and are starting out, you’re going to these to hand out cards; by all means have books on hand in case you get lucky, but you’re dispensing information and building your author profile. It’s going to be all about the conversations you have, the fun and the connections. It will have nothing to do with immediate profit. The only time I break even on book sales versus venue fee is when I don’t have to pay for my table at all, and that’s rather normal. And it’s good that I have gotten any interest at all with a single book, when I’m often told to expect nothing until I have at least two books out. I’m working on that.
